RE: EPA Dialogue Summary: Outreach (July 11)

[Bill Aird <bill.aird@cta-otc.gc.ca>]

Hi.  Bill Aird, Senior Environmental Officer, with the Canadian Transportation Agency.

When I first signed up to participate in this dialogue I thought I wouldn't have much to say - however I have been enthralled by the discussions and find that our reglatory worlds have much in common.

Sally wrote:
". . . how EPA can identify the audience for EPA information and how groups and individuals might inform EPA of their interest.  ...how can the Agency enable underserved populations to participate more effectively."  Sally did a commendable job of summarizing the disussion together.

The discussion focused on questions about who is the interested/affected audience?  what should the message to them be?  how do we involve the public?  Those are important questions but I did not hear anything about - what is effective participation.  

I am involved in environmental assessments and dispute resolution. Both fields are predicated on public involvement but what should our expectation of public participation be?  We can hold public meetings and many attend, but only 5 file out the feedback form - does that mean that the public is not concerned? We hold public hearings and 25 interested members of the public speak - does this reflect a high degree of public concern?  Public notices are published and press releases are issued and there is little reaction - is the public not interested?

My background is in both science and the social sciences.  I think that the answers to my questions lie with the social scientists.  They may be able to shed some light on - what communiction tools are effective in which situations, - what amount of public participation represents a significant input,   - how do you corelate value judgements from the public with the expectations for scientific knowledge of decision-makers.

Are we setting the bar for public participation too high?  It is important to seek out the public and encourage them to participate but when we hear from only a few them are we merely facing the reality that only a small per centage of the public wish to get involved?  I believe that the social sciences may have the answer as to how high we should set the bar given normal public response levels.  

Remember not everyone will response to our well-worded and widely-distributed messages via the internet or whatever media we chose to employ. 

Thanks
Bill